Paradox

Chapter One:

Behind me flickered on a fluorescent light casting all five of our silhouettes to stretch out onto the dry neglected lawn. We stood in silence facing the old abandoned Victorian-like house that had once been a chapter in our very suburban streets, and to some who had lived to see it in its full glory, its presence remained to make skins crawl with memories that burned like scars.
Okay, the scar part wasn't entirely true, but no one could blame me for wanting to splatter some excitement in quaint little Westhorne Avenue!
But that didn't mean there wasn't something mysterious about its oppressive existence, and that wasn't because it had just gone past curfew and that we would all be done for if we got caught red handed.
A gray blanket of clouds loomed above, thick with a cold and unnatural aura, which had seemed to have made it all the more ominous. It had been humid all week, the sticky kind of mugginess that no matter how many windows you have open in the house, you would still slumped in your own puddle of desperation. But not that evening--no, in fact it was quite the opposite. A chilly storm was brewing.

I was sure that we all experienced that same irrepressible shudder as if someone had just walked over our graves, because from the corners of my eyes where Ashley and Daniel were stilted either side of me, I noticed both of them shiver as I did.
My eyes widened warily, following the large army of brittle ivy--trailing decades from the looks of it. Dancing their way up to the fourth story where a boxed blacked-out window featured. I assumed it was the attic, no room that large would have one window that small. It reminded me of an episode from a cartoon sketch my cousin once made me watch as a child.

It was about a mad scientist, a tall alligator wearing a white long lab coat with oversized glasses, who had locked a monstrous creature somewhere within the darkness of his attic, where only the moonlight glaring from the small square window exposed the outline of its fury and bony stature.

One foggy night, under the crimson moon prophecy and a baleful wolf howling through the dark and lonely rural streets, the monster had broken free from its shackles and hunted down its captor. A comedic throw to the wall and the scientist was battered and bruised, begging for his secret project to spare his life. The gaunt hunched creature finally spoke, its voice gravely and deep. "How could you do this to me... brother?" Gasp! Plot twist!
The coward scrambled to the corner of the room, speechless, but there was no remorse. Instead, the only emotion building up in his animated expression was rage and jealousy.
"Because you had everything, George!" I actually don't know what his name was, but it was somewhere along that line. George... Geoffrey... Gabriel? Names were too complex for me to remember at that age, but it definitely began with a G! I think...

That night, after years of his own flesh and blood experimenting on him from the inside out, kidnapped and hidden away from his family, a nerve had then snapped, turning Joseph? into the beast his brother brainwashed him to become and with that, the mad scientist was about to be handed his grand prize! Dramatic synth chords screeched with flashing red lights as his victim raised his hairy pour with extended claws and slashed open the throat of a resentful man. We didn't actually see that, the scene cut off right before but my cousin told me that's what happened! The next thing we saw however was the tragic creature, who was once a happy man with a family; crawling back into the furthest part of the attic and ending on a pair of yellow glowing eyes peering through the shadows...

Spine chilling.

"Pretty creepy, huh?" Daniel leaned in with a hint of enthusiasm.
"Yeah, no kidding." I scoffed, deep in thought.
"This place is a dump!" Cassidy complained, exaggerating the word 'dump' in a high-pitched tone as she kicked an empty can somewhere. We all shot her a scathing glare.
"What the hell, Cass?"
"What? Am I going to wake up a ghost? Give me a break." She said with a wave of the hand.
"No, Cass. You and your big mouth are gonna to wake up the whole street." Marcus clucked. Marcus started his way to the main entrance, cautiously as if anticipating a "Enter at Your Own Risk" sign buried beneath the monstrous grass, only to stumble into a homemade booby trap for anyone who dared! I won't lie though, I was kind of waiting for it.
"You realize this place is a restricted area, right? We'll get into some serious trouble if we get caught." Ashley interrupted, educating Cassidy with common sense.
"Why? It's not like anyone owns it. I mean... look at it. Ew."
"Doesn't matter. The area is residential, which means no access to kids who, like, totally have no business here!" Okay, Ashley's impersonation of Cass was iconic!
"Then why are you still talking?" She sneered. Ashley rolled her eyes and muttered something under her breath, my guess it wasn't a compliment.